The major bank announced in a statement this morning that it had completed an “experiment” using an Ethereum blockchain platform in coordination with five domestic and international trade partners to send 17 tonnes of almonds from Mildura, Victoria to Hamburg, Germany.

The platform, underpinned by distributed ledger technology, also utilised smart contracts and the Internet of Things (IoT) to track the shipment “from packer to end delivery”, according to the statement.

The blockchain platform allowed for the operations, documentation and finance aspects of the global trade process to be digitised and streamlined as container information, task completion, certificate of origin and shipping and customs documents were able to be stored on the blockchain.

“By bringing together partners from across the end-to-end supply chain and developing a new platform underpinned by emerging technology, blockchain and IoT, we were able to prove a concept to modernise global trade,” said CBA managing director of global trade commodities and trade Alex Toone.